One Last Time
by Jameson Rook
Summary: Five times Richard Castle didn't say 'Good Bye'. And one time he did...


_**Disclaimer: Castle and all of its characters belong to Andrew W. Marlowe, and ABC. The song "One Last Time" belongs to Dusty Drake.**_

_** When she picked up the telephone,**_

_** His voice came on the line.**_

_** She said "This can't be happening.**_

_** An' the tears fell from her eyes.**_

_** She said "What am I supposed to do?**_

_** I can't handle losin' you."**_

_** He said "I just had to call to say good bye**_

_** One last time."**_

__ ONE

"Why do you wear the watch?" He asked in bewilderment, looking at the time piece that look far too big for her slender wrist.

"My dad took her death hard...he's...he's sober now. Five years. So," She took a shaky breath and pointed to the watch. "This is for the life I saved." She reached for the chain on her neck and flashed the shimmering ring at him. " And this is for the life I lost. I guess your Nikki Heat has a back story now, Castle." He paused a moment, his eyes glittering with unshedtears for this unbreakable, extraordinary woman.

"I don't know. I did like the whole 'hooker by day, cop by night' thing." She gave him a sincere smile of gratitude and cocked one eye brow at him. "But I _guess_ the 'heavy emotional angle' could work too." He feigned exhasperation.

"Well, don't bewilder your audience with substance on my account, Castle." She teased, shrugging into her jacket.

"Until tomorrow, Detective." Castle gave her a soft smile. She gave him a curious look.

"You can't just say 'night'?"

"I'm a writer. 'Night' is boring. 'Until tomorrow' is more...hopeful." He gave her that trademark impish grin that always made her stomach flip flop until she composed herself.

"Yeah, well, I'm a cop. Night." He chuckled lightly as they were their seperate ways, the words 'until tomorrow' still lingering in the front of his mind.

_**He said "There are some things in this life,**_

_** That are out of our control.**_

_** Like who we fall in love with,**_

_** And when it's time to go."**_

_** And she said "What about the plans we had?"**_

_** He said "This connection's getting bad.**_

_** Now, come on baby, let me hear you smile**_

_** One last time."**_

TWO

"There's something I need you to do." She said almost quietly, knowing already what his response to her demand was going to be. She felt the anticipation of it rising in her throat.

"Name it." She would never get over how blindly he followed her. Trusted her. _Loved her._

"Go home." The two words fell from her mouth like venom coarsing through his veins. He leveled an icy stare at her to match her own.

"Forget it. Fear does not exsist in this dojo." He responded, making his way closer to her. She let out an exhasperated sigh.

"Look, I signed up for this when I put that badge on, you didn't." She looked at him again, her eyes pleading with his. "It's not your fight."

"The hell it isn't." She braced herself for the tongue lashing that she knew was hidden behind those words. "I don't hang around you just to annoy you. I don't ride out to murder scenes in the middle of the night out of morbid curiousity." He stalkde closer to her with each declerations. Though she knew that the decleration he was making with out words was far more important. "If that's all it was I would have quit a long time ago.

"Well, then why do you keep coming back, Rick?" She raised her arms as she asked the one question that she knew would shake him to his core.

"Look, I may not have a badge, unless you count the chocolate one Alexis got me for my birthday," The look she threw at him told him that she didn't. "But, I'll tell you this. Like it or not, I'm your plucky sidekick." He cocked his head and brushed past her to sit on the couch.

"Plucky sidekick always gets killed." She spoke to the vacant spot where he had been standing before turning around to face him. He had settled himself onto the far end of the couch and flicked open the file folder in his hand before turning his gaze back up to meet hers, his blue eyes defiant and determined.

"Partner than." He said, though it wasn't so much a statemant as it was a question masquerading as a statement. He looked at her expectantly and was shocked to find a soft smile gracing her exquisite features.

"Okay."

_**She started to apologize,**_

_** For all the things that she'd done wrong.**_

_** She said "I would have loved you better,**_

_** If I had only known."**_

__ THREE

The blue hue of the freezer seemed to only add to the chill that seeped into every crevice of his body. His bones ached with the cold that tried to pull him into the darkness that tinged his field of vision.

"Castle," Beckett's voice was soft, and slow. It was like even her words were being coated in the inescapable frost. "Are you there?" The desperation to hear him was overwhelming.

"Yeah, I-I'm alright, I'm fine. I'm r-right here." He tightened his hold on her slightly, feeling his joints creak with the movement. He wanted to reassure her that everything was going to be okay, that someone would be there any minute to save them and laugh at how dumb it was that they got locked in a freezer.

"I can't f-feel anything." She whispered into the vast, emptiness of the freezer. Castle attempted to cast a glance down at her, but his neck felt as though it was frozen in place and his eyes felt like they were moving through custard. "I always thought that, being a cop, I'd take a bullet." He pressed his cheek against her hair, shivering violently as he listened, hanging on her every word. "I never thought I'd freeze to death." She let out a small, sarcastic chuckle.

"Hey, we're-we're not dead yet." He tried to lighten the mood by joking, a ghost of a laugh skating through his words. He rub his hand up and down her arm lightly, trying to generate some heat from the friction.

"I just wish this was one of your books and you could rewrite the ending." She had no idea how much he wanted that too. She took a few shaky breaths, the heaving the only sound filling the silence.

"I'm-I'm sorry." Castle stuttered.

"For what?"

"F-for being m-me." She waited for him to elaborate, completely confused as to why he was apologizing to her. "For going rogue, getting int-into this. If we hadn't gone-."

"Hey, shh, Castle." She tried to soothe him. She need him to know that she didn't blame him for any of this. "Shh. You were right. We found the bomb. We were just too late, okay?" He nodded slightly and whispered 'okay' into her hair. Kate was suddenly overcome with the need to see his face. She rollde herself over, the cold causing her more pain than she thought was possible, and rested her head on his chest.

Castle reveled in the feeling of her hand resting over his slowly beatin heart. In the feeling of her being in his arms. But he cursed the fact that being on the edge of death was the only reason that they were able to be this way together.

"Castle," She lifted her hand to caress his cheek but missed, falling short and just grazing his chin with the tips of her fingers. "Thank you. For being there." He attempted a smile, but his face felt like it was made of ice cubes.

"Always." He murmured to her, reassuring her that he wasn't going anywhere.

"I just want you to know how much I lo-." His heart sank to his feet when he felt her hand slip into his lap.

"Hey, Kate." He pulled her closer to his chest. "Stay with me." He reached his hand around and caressed her cheek softly, trying to bring her back from the edge. He wasn't ready for this to be good bye. He needed to know what she was going to say. "Stay with me." He felt the blackness seeping into his own mind, and finally, gave in to sleep.

_**He said "You were the perfect wife.**_

_** Promise me you'll go on with your life."**_

_** She said "The boys won't understand."**_

_** He said "Tell 'em Daddy loves them, and to be strong, whoa."**_

__FOUR

"What about you, Rick?" She asked, daring him to tell her differently.

"Of course I don't want anything to happen to you! I'm your partner. I'm your friend." He jutted out his jaw defiantly in answer to her challenge. She crossed her arms across her chest defensively.

"Is that what we are?" She bent one knee and leaned slightly to the side.

"You know what? I don't know _what_ we are. We kiss, but we never talk about it. We almost die, frozen in each others arms, but we _never talk about it_. So, no, I got no clue what we are. I know I don't want to see you throw your life away." He snarled, stepping closer to her.

"The last time I checked it was _my _life, not your personal jungle gym." Rick felt the sting of her words sinking into him, despite the anger that radiated through his entire being. "And for the past three years, I've been running around with the school's _funniest kid_. And it's not enough." She brushed past him, intent on showing him _exactly_ where to go.

"You know, this isn't about your mother's case anymore. This is about you needing a place to hide. You've been chasing thing so long, that you're afraid to find out who you are without it." He almost immediately regreted speaking those words.

"You don't know me, Castle." She threw down her fist angrily, as if she was throwing down the proverbial gauntlet. "You _think_ you do, but you don't."

"I know you crawled inside your mother's murder and you didn't come out. I know you hide in there, the same way you hide in these no where relationships with men _you don't love_." He vaguely registered the thought that they had never had a fight this bad before. "You could be happy, Kate. You _deserve_ to be happy. But you're afraid."

"You know what we are, Castle? We are over." She saw the pain written all over his face. "Now get out." She walked away. She had really walked away from him. He was pissed, and he was going to comply with her wishes. But he was not going to say good bye. Not to his extraordinary KB. Never good bye.

_** He said "Honey, I've got to go."**_

_** She said "Don't you dare hang up.**_

_** There's so many things I need to say.**_

_** I love you so much."**_

__FIVE

"Roy Montgomery taught me what it meant to be a cop." Kate's voice was strong, completely masking the pain she was filled with. "He taught me that we are bound by our choices, that we are more than our mistakes." A pause. "Captain Montgomery once told me that, for us, there are no victories, only battles, and the best that you can hope for is to find a place to make your stand. And if you're very lucky you find someone willing to stand with you." She couldn't help but look at Castle, letting the love and compassion that eminated from those warm blue eyes wash over her. "Our Captain would want us to carry on the fight."

Some where in the distance he saw something. A flash. A brief flicker in a second. He squinted at it, trying to decide what it was. He could have brushed it off as a glint off of a name plate. But he had been working with the NYPD for far too long to be that naive.

Then he saw it again, and a second too late he heard the tell tale _crack_ echo across the field. Time seemed to slow to a near stop as the bullet entered Beckett's chest. Pain flicked across her face, and then he was moving.

"Kate!" He screamed, tackling her into the soft grass, but careful not to let his weight land on her. He vaguely heard Esposito yell for Lanie to get down and heard Ryan's panick stricken voice bellow 'Beckett's down!' into the walkie, but that was all secondary to the feel of Kate's hand gripping his bicep lightly.

"Kate, stay with me, okay?" Her stare was blank, almost like she didn't recognize who he was anymore. "Don't leave me. Please?" He pleaded, his voice cracking with emotion that threatened to drown him. "Stay with me." He couldn't lose her. She had to know why. "Kate, I love you." He felt his breath hitch in his throat, it felt so good to finally say it. "I love you, Kate." She smiled softly, and somehow he knew she had heard him. And he knew that she was going to be alright, she had to be. Because he knew, with that one look, that she loved him too.

_**It was almost like she felt him leave,**_

_** She cried out "Can you still hear me?"**_

_** She fell down on the kitchen floor,**_

_** When the signal died,**_

_** As the pilot tried to pull out of the dive,**_

_** One last...**_

___You have reached Alexis Castle, I'm away from my desk at the-. _

_ Hey, this is Connor Castle, I obviously haven't answered-._

_ Roy Castle's phone. You know what to do._

Rick stared at his phone, shocked that none of his children were answering. He waited a moment, taking in a deep, quaking breath, and dialed the most familiar number in his head. The phone rang three times before the her voice came on the line.

"Kate, it's me."

"Rick, we've been married for twelve years. I know what your number is." She chuckled. "Hey, aren't you supposed to be on a plane home right now?"

"Where are the kids?" He asked, trying to mask the quiver in his voice.

"Well, Alexis' has to defend a case today, and the boys are in school. Why?" She asked skeptically.

"You remember when you told me before that plane's are the safest way to travel? Well...it seems that we were wrong." He let out a dry laugh. "The pilot says that we're going into a dive. We've lost both of the engines. Kate, I...I won't be coming home."

"Oh, God. Rick, this...no. You're lying." She said, her voice laced with anger.

"Sadly, babe, no." His voice finally broke with the sound of the tears that fell softly onto his pressed dress pants.

"Rick, I can't do this." She sobbed softly into his ear, a crackling coming from the poor connection. "We had so much planned, Richard."

"I know, baby. But, sometimes we can't plan everything. I had no idea this would happen." He whispered. In the back ground the plane was in chaos, flight attendants scurried about, trying to get everything settled. A mask dangled in front of his face, but he refused to strap it to over his nose. "I called to hear your voice one last time, Katie. Let me hear that beautiful smile. Tell me a story."

"We're on that beach that you have as your screen saver. It's our ten year anniversary." Her voice was choked with sobs. "And we're happy, so happy, Rick. We've just found out that I'm pregnant again. A girl. We're going to name her Johanna. And you hold me and tell me how much you love me."

"I do, Kate. So very, very much. Tell the boys and Alexis that Daddy loves them. And our Johanna." Kate unconciously rubbed a hand over her eight month pregnant stomach, feeling the Johanna kick at the sound of her father's voice. "Tell her stories about me."

"I will. You know I will. I love you." She cried. "I don't want to lose you, Rick. I don't want to see the lights go out."

"You don't have to, honey. The connection's going south. I have to go. It's going to be soon." She could hear the fear that was scratching to get out of his throat, but he wouldn't let her know how scared he truly was.

"Don't you dare hang up this phone, Richard Alexander Rodgers." She hissed, tears falling onto her stomach. "I'm sorry that I haven't been perfect. I should have admitted to loving you sooner. We haven't had long enough, damn it!"

"Kate, you were perfect. You will be my extraordinary KB forever." He whispered as he peered out the window and watched the ground closing in. "Always."

"Always." She murmured back. And then, as if by some force of nature, she felt him slip away. She knew he was gone but still she screamed. "Can you hear me? Rick? RICK?" Then she hit her knees in the middle of their kitchen, sobbing until there were no more tears left to cry and curled into the fetal position, her hands clenched around the telephone.

Alexis came into the kitchen and wrapped her arms around her mother, not quite sure what had happened. She rocked her and whispered soothing words into her hair. The twins bolted into the house, rough housing like thirteen year olds will do, but they stopped immediately.

"Mom, what's wrong?" Roy asked softly, running his hand over his mother's hair lightly as he and his brother kneeled next to her. She simply shook her head, turned on the news, and watched as he television screen was filled with a plane number and a picture of a firey inferno in a field. 'Flight from Los Angeles, California to New York's JFK airport crashes in field in Montana'. She heard her children all gasp and break into sobs. Alexis clutched her brothers to her chest and looked at Kate over their heads, tears streaking her freckled face.

Kate turned, walked to their bedroom, slipped out of her shirt and into Rick's dark blue button down. She slid into his side of the bed, pulled the goose down comforter around her and inhaled his scent. Picking up her phone, she dialed the most familiar number in her head. There were only three rings before she heard the beep.

'_Hey, this is Rick Castle, I am unable to get to the phone right now. Please leave a message and I'll get back to you. Unless it's Kate...if this is Kate I'll be home soon...don't ask the boys if we were playing poker...oh, shit, the recording is going to run out soon...Love you!'_

**END**


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